Supply-Side Shocks: Strikes and Utilization of Contraception in Kenya—Are Doctors or Nurses More Essential for a Thriving Family Program?

Kristin Bietsch , Avenir Health
Priya Emmart, Avenir Health
Hellen Sidha, Reproductive and Maternal Health Services Unit

This paper measures the impact of shocks in family planning during the Kenya doctors’ and nurses’ Strikes of 2016-2017. Our paper analyses the distribution of family planning through the public health sector from December 2015 through August 2018, focusing on the dips and recoveries around the two strikes. We include monthly family planning commodity and visits data from the Kenyan District Health Information System. Our analysis finds that declines were greater and more sustained in the nurses’ strike than the doctor’s strike, both in terms of Couple Years of Protect distributed, and individual methods. Immediately following the end of the nurses’ strike, there is a complete recovery in monthly family planning distribution. This is one of the first papers to examine impact of shocks from the supply side perspective and the first to differentiate between withdrawal of services by type of provider on family planning.

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 Presented in Session 242. Challenges in Operationalizing Population and Reproductive Health Policies and Programs